The way Georgeanne Ries’ flute sounded during Debussy’s Syrinx this afternoon communicated everything about her friendship with Martha Herby directly into the deepest recesses of those who listened at the memorial service today. And Martha was alive again, vital and intensely musical in a recording of her 1990 performance of Gluck’s Dance of the Blessed Spirits with the West Coast Chamber Orchestra. Even those who had only just met her shortly before her death heard the completeness of a musician at the height of her art, and in the totality of their spirits suddenly, instinctively knew all there was to know about a wonderful, complex person. All the arts are able to communicate feelings and intentions of their creators, and both reflect the time in which they’re created and the time in which they’re viewed. But music has such immediacy and power, subtlety and depth – and above all, the ability to give us access to the inaccessible, both within and without.
Categories